Council talks of settlement with mosque during executive session

The property at 127 Fillow Street in Norwalk is the area for the proposed mosque/community hall. Hour photo/Matthew Vinci

The property at 127 Fillow Street in Norwalk is the area for the proposed mosque/community hall. Hour photo/Matthew Vinci

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The property at 127 Fillow Street in Norwalk is the area for the proposed mosque/community hall. Hour photo/Matthew Vinci

The property at 127 Fillow Street in Norwalk is the area for the proposed mosque/community hall. Hour photo/Matthew Vinci

Council talks of settlement with mosque during executive session

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NORWALK -- Common Council members went behind closed doors Monday evening to speak with attorneys about a proposed settlement agreement between the city and Al Madany Islamic Center of Norwalk.

The settlement, if approved by the council Tuesday evening, would allow Al Madany to build a 21,800-square-foot mosque/multipurpose hall at 127 Fillow St. in West Norwalk.

"It's just providing whatever information is available to the council, so they have a clear picture of what the alternatives are," Mayor Harry W. Rilling said of the executive session meeting beforehand.

At least a dozen council members attended the executive session meeting in the council chambers at City Hall on Monday evening.

Also present were Corporation Counsel Mario F. Coppola and attorneys Joseph P. Williams and Marci A. Hamilton, part of the city's counsel, as well as former Corporation Counsel Robert F. Maslan, Jr.

The council will be asked Tuesday evening to vote on the monetary aspects of the proposed settlement.

They include a $53,000 payment from the city to Stonegate Condominium Association (130 Fillow St.) and a $307,500 payment from the city's insurance carrier, the Connecticut Interlocal Risk Management Agency (CIRMA), to Al Madany.

CIRMA recently agreed to pick up the entire $307,500 payment to Al Madany representing out-of-pocket litigation costs, according to officials.

Tuesday's council meeting, at which the public is welcome to speak, has been relocated to the Community Room of City Hall to accommodate the anticipated crowd (see related story).

The settlement proposal, if approved, would resolve a two-year-old lawsuit brought by Al Madany against the city after the Norwalk Zoning Commission in June 2012 rejected plans for a 27,000-square-foot facility on the 1.5-acre property.

The settlement, like the original plans, has sparked strong passions in the community.

Neighbors and others maintain the proposed 21,800-square-foot building remains too large for the property, which is located in a residential zone, and exacerbate traffic at the intersection of Fillow Street and North Taylor Avenue.

Hamilton told residents at the public hearing before the city's Zoning Commission last Thursday that the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act (RLUIPA) governs the lawsuit.

"Under the First Amendment, the city has a certain burden in these kinds of challenges, which the city could easily meet. But under RLUIPA, the burden on the city is much more extreme," Hamilton told The Hour before Monday evening's executive session meeting. "So the city has to prove that whatever it's doing is for a compelling interest, and it is the least restrictive way of doing it for this set of believers."

Hamilton said the legal standard is found nowhere else in Constitutional law.

"It was concocted by Congress and local governments are now having to deal with it around the country," Hamilton said. "It's put the city between a rock and a hard place."

Several hundred residents, including Al Madany members, attended the public hearing on the settlement proposal before Zoning commissioners in Norwalk Concert Hall last Thursday evening.

Most speakers urged the commission to reject the settlement agreement. They asked the city to work with Al Madany to find a larger parcel for the proposed mosque and multipurpose hall.

"The mandate from our taxpayers is to spend money trying to fight this (lawsuit) and we have a good chance (of winning)," resident Isabelle Hargrove told commissioners. "You guys are being bullied."

Afterward, commissioners approved the settlement proposal on a 4-3 vote, sending the plan to the Common Council for further action.

Al Madany respresentatives maintain the new plan would not overburden the property nor streets, and that it would fulfill congregants' longstanding desire to have a worship place in Norwalk.

"We are one step closer to being able to have our own mosque in Norwalk where we can pray and celebrate our religious holidays as families," Farhan Memon, Al Madany spokesman and board member, said afterward. "We hope to be the best neighbors possible to the community there at the intersection of Taylor and Fillow streets, and we hope that over time we'll be able to look past on this and say that, you know, we all tried our best to come to an agreement that was fair to everyone."